It's 10 pm on Independence Day. In honor of the holiday, I am drinking, but in honor of passing the bar, I am also writing out some notes.
The animals are all weirded out by the fireworks on the river. Curtis is wandering around being emo, and Jerome and Cersei are cuddled up by me on the bed. (I am trying the "play it cool but don't make a big deal about it" method of dealing with her fear.)
It's the first 4th in... seven years that I haven't gone to see the fireworks. Just one more thing that's happened in this awful year. This too shall pass.
ANYWAY, I was quite amused because I'm:
a) drinking
b) writing out notes for Chapter 11 (corporate) bankruptcy law
c) reading stories about Punk Rock Houses when my hand gets tired of writing.
The punk rock and corporate bankruptcy stuff clash so nicely.
Friday, July 4, 2008
Housekeeping
Heartworm pill (Iverhart) to Cersei, Catvantage to cats. I need more catvantage - the first thing I thought when I opened up the box was "why the hell did I buy six doses for two cats" and then I remembered that I'd bought like $150 or $200 worth of pet meds that day and I didn't want to spend that much more!
I know I could get my meds a bit cheaper online, but I just shop thru my vet usually. The actual savings for buying online for most preventatives isn't that great, and I like to support my wonderful vet. If it were something like Rimadyl, which actually is a lot cheaper online, I'd probably get it online.
Last night Jerome persisted in licking my barbri books. He likes to lick the edges. He likes it A LOT. He is a bizarre little beast. I put up with his weird ways because he is so amazingly sweet at bedtime. Bedtime is his favorite time - he comes dashing up as soon as I turn out the light. He just explodes with purring and trilling and begging for scritches, then settles down pretty quickly and curls up around my head. Then he goes to sleep. It's the very picture of contentment. :) You can lick my books, little buddy.
I know I could get my meds a bit cheaper online, but I just shop thru my vet usually. The actual savings for buying online for most preventatives isn't that great, and I like to support my wonderful vet. If it were something like Rimadyl, which actually is a lot cheaper online, I'd probably get it online.
Last night Jerome persisted in licking my barbri books. He likes to lick the edges. He likes it A LOT. He is a bizarre little beast. I put up with his weird ways because he is so amazingly sweet at bedtime. Bedtime is his favorite time - he comes dashing up as soon as I turn out the light. He just explodes with purring and trilling and begging for scritches, then settles down pretty quickly and curls up around my head. Then he goes to sleep. It's the very picture of contentment. :) You can lick my books, little buddy.
Thursday, July 3, 2008
Freedom to bolt, at RPF, and my experiences with Champ
Edna over at Red Pony Farm started off wondering why her horse is more curious about Horse Eating Monsters when at liberty than when ridden. Maybe, she thinks, it's because the mare feels like she's free to bolt if she wants to, so she's braver? She mentioned horses who freak out with too much contact, compared with horses who turn into The Black Stallion if they aren't ridden with contact. I've got both types, lucky me.
Champ was my first horse. A really nice down to earth old fellow sold him to me - he'd bought Champ as a yearling, trained him, and kept him for the next 11 years. In that understated old southern guy way, he gave me some advice about Champ. "Just ride him in that bridle that I'm giving you with him. He doesn't need a fancier bit. And don't get up in his mouth, you don't need to do that."
I heard him, but like most of life, I didn't understand him til I'd made my own mistakes.
Back at my ghetto boarding barn, I had a couple of nice days tooling around on a loose rein, like a WP quarter horse. The experts gathered around. "He's a gaited horse. Hold him back or he won't gait! If you're not holding his head up and he trips he'll fall and break his jaw."* It kinda sounded like bullshit to me but I also didn't want my horse to break his jaw, so I started riding with more contact.
*This is actual honest to god advice I received, yall.
My nice horse went away. He got really fractious and was constantly tossing his head or backing up. If I kicked him forward when he was backing up, then made him stand, he'd rear. We almost died when he backed out of the median into the path of a semi. Neither of us were happy.
I thought back to what the nice old fellow had told me. "Don't get all up in his mouth." Was I, in fact, "all up in his mouth"? But I wasn't pulling hard, honestly! It was just light contact! Well, I decided to try to ride him like a QH again. I dropped the reins, to a certain point. He pulled and fussed and tried to get me to let go of them completely, and I told him he had plenty of slack and to quit fussing. He decided that yes, he did have plenty of slack.
My sweet sensible horse came back. He quit rearing (except when I ask him to cross something he doesn't want to cross, and then I just whack him on the neck and tell him to quit clowning and he does what I ask without anymore fuss). He quit backing up - except for when I pick up contact but don't signal with my legs. How about that - he was doing what he'd been trained to do when he tried to kill us on the highway.
I did a LOT of reading about horse psychology and intuitive cues around that time. I learned that the natural cue for a rear is pressure on the reins (don't go forward) plus pressure from your legs (go forward). How about that - I was very clearly "telling" him to rear and then getting mad at him for it. Poor guy.
So Champ is a gelding who demands to be ridden on very light or no contact. Over the years, we've gotten to where I can ride him with the lightest possible contact, when I want him to gait. If I'm letting him rate his own speed, there has got to be slack in the reins or he's fussin. Tossing his head and chomping the bit and turning his head to roll his eyes at me. He's not nearly as emotional and weird as my mares, but he's got just as much personality as any horse I've ever met.
And no, I was never stupid enough to try changing out his bit (medium port unbroken medium shank curb bit). I did try riding him in a Dr. Cook's Bitless Bridle, but that was an immediate failure. I suspect the feel of the straps grabbing his head was really annoying / claustrophobic, because he refused to listen and came closer to bolting with that thing on his head than he ever has before.
Anyway, that's Champ, and I'm not sure what relevance it really has to Edna's post. But I can attest that some horses just Do Not Want Contact.
Champ was my first horse. A really nice down to earth old fellow sold him to me - he'd bought Champ as a yearling, trained him, and kept him for the next 11 years. In that understated old southern guy way, he gave me some advice about Champ. "Just ride him in that bridle that I'm giving you with him. He doesn't need a fancier bit. And don't get up in his mouth, you don't need to do that."
I heard him, but like most of life, I didn't understand him til I'd made my own mistakes.
Back at my ghetto boarding barn, I had a couple of nice days tooling around on a loose rein, like a WP quarter horse. The experts gathered around. "He's a gaited horse. Hold him back or he won't gait! If you're not holding his head up and he trips he'll fall and break his jaw."* It kinda sounded like bullshit to me but I also didn't want my horse to break his jaw, so I started riding with more contact.
*This is actual honest to god advice I received, yall.
My nice horse went away. He got really fractious and was constantly tossing his head or backing up. If I kicked him forward when he was backing up, then made him stand, he'd rear. We almost died when he backed out of the median into the path of a semi. Neither of us were happy.
I thought back to what the nice old fellow had told me. "Don't get all up in his mouth." Was I, in fact, "all up in his mouth"? But I wasn't pulling hard, honestly! It was just light contact! Well, I decided to try to ride him like a QH again. I dropped the reins, to a certain point. He pulled and fussed and tried to get me to let go of them completely, and I told him he had plenty of slack and to quit fussing. He decided that yes, he did have plenty of slack.
My sweet sensible horse came back. He quit rearing (except when I ask him to cross something he doesn't want to cross, and then I just whack him on the neck and tell him to quit clowning and he does what I ask without anymore fuss). He quit backing up - except for when I pick up contact but don't signal with my legs. How about that - he was doing what he'd been trained to do when he tried to kill us on the highway.
I did a LOT of reading about horse psychology and intuitive cues around that time. I learned that the natural cue for a rear is pressure on the reins (don't go forward) plus pressure from your legs (go forward). How about that - I was very clearly "telling" him to rear and then getting mad at him for it. Poor guy.
So Champ is a gelding who demands to be ridden on very light or no contact. Over the years, we've gotten to where I can ride him with the lightest possible contact, when I want him to gait. If I'm letting him rate his own speed, there has got to be slack in the reins or he's fussin. Tossing his head and chomping the bit and turning his head to roll his eyes at me. He's not nearly as emotional and weird as my mares, but he's got just as much personality as any horse I've ever met.
And no, I was never stupid enough to try changing out his bit (medium port unbroken medium shank curb bit). I did try riding him in a Dr. Cook's Bitless Bridle, but that was an immediate failure. I suspect the feel of the straps grabbing his head was really annoying / claustrophobic, because he refused to listen and came closer to bolting with that thing on his head than he ever has before.
Anyway, that's Champ, and I'm not sure what relevance it really has to Edna's post. But I can attest that some horses just Do Not Want Contact.
Wednesday, July 2, 2008
Yeah, ANOTHER post
Cersei had a good time at the dog park today! She played with other dogs, like, half the time and only had to go be introspective in the water part of the time. Yay.
She met (for the first time, I believe) a female Doberman and it was instant love. They play-bowed at each other and went butt-tucking running in circles chasing each other crazy. Then the enormous pit bull showed up and - because it was Cersei's second time meeting the pit - they all three played!
A small white pit showed up and the chase game got a little crazy with a little growling, so all the dog owners called their dogs back and made them calm down. Then we let them go again. It's really nice to be surrounded by responsible pet owners.
Also I studied a lot more, so now I'm going to play Dwarf Fortress.
She met (for the first time, I believe) a female Doberman and it was instant love. They play-bowed at each other and went butt-tucking running in circles chasing each other crazy. Then the enormous pit bull showed up and - because it was Cersei's second time meeting the pit - they all three played!
A small white pit showed up and the chase game got a little crazy with a little growling, so all the dog owners called their dogs back and made them calm down. Then we let them go again. It's really nice to be surrounded by responsible pet owners.
Also I studied a lot more, so now I'm going to play Dwarf Fortress.
Nerd alert - hoof pictures galore.
So I just checked the mail. There was some goofy catalog for clothing and jewelry featuring horses - stuff I'd never buy. (How do these people find me? I haven't ordered ANYTHING at this address.) But anyway, on the cover was a cute paint horse walking through a shallow pond. She had a foot raised to take the next step and the first thing I thought was "talk about underrun heels!" Then I flipped through the catalog to make sure they weren't selling anything useful, like tack, and threw it away.
Anyway, I haven't been trimming my horses. The last time I trimmed was at the end of April. It's a bit of an ongoing experiment - I've checked their hooves every time I've seen them, and if anybody seemed too long or uncomfortable, I would've dragged my rasp and stand down and fixed the problem. But Carmon's horses live on a mountain and self-trim. And there are wild horses in non-rocky areas who self-trim. I wondered how mine would do with a lot of room to roam but only dirt to wear their hooves down.
It's actually a success, as far as I can tell! Champ's feet looked pretty good before, and they look AMAZING now. Here's a blurry pic of his RF in March 07 (barefoot for 3 months, IIRC.)
Here's his LF from last week. The wall looks horrible and ragged, but it's wearing off. Not chipping off nicely into a mustang roll like if he lived on rock, but somehow wearing off nonetheless. And his FROGS! I really had no idea that his frogs could and would expand so much, ever! He wore keg shoes from when he was probably 2 til 13, and he had nice-ish shod feet with puny frogs.
Here's his rear from March 07. His rears have always looked better (most horses' do), even though he wore shoes on the rears too. I thought he had nicer frogs, but high inside heels.
LOOK AT THE DIFFERENCE! (Yeah, I know I'm yelling, but I'm a nerd and I get really excited about pretty frogs.) I even think the high inside heel is not as prominent.
At first, when I was looking through the pictures I'd taken, I really thought that was a picture of Poppy's feet. But I *know* I didn't pick up anybody's feet except Champ, and Poppy has a longer thicker tail and hairier fetlocks, so... that must be Champ's foot.
And I didn't pick up Dixie Quinn's feet, but I don't have any old pictures of solar views anyway. We'll compare apples to apples with her. Here's her feet, shortly after I got her. The short back story is that she was a padded show horse for a season, then shod (fronts only) with heavy keg shoes. Her hoof capsules were horribly distorted - padded TWHs are the very definition of long toes / underrun heels. This is about a month after I got her and had her shoes pulled. You can see how much I pulled her toes back.
Here they are today. Down in the grass you can see a tiny bit of ski-tip still growing out, but otherwise, her feet have healed really nicely.
Anyway, I haven't been trimming my horses. The last time I trimmed was at the end of April. It's a bit of an ongoing experiment - I've checked their hooves every time I've seen them, and if anybody seemed too long or uncomfortable, I would've dragged my rasp and stand down and fixed the problem. But Carmon's horses live on a mountain and self-trim. And there are wild horses in non-rocky areas who self-trim. I wondered how mine would do with a lot of room to roam but only dirt to wear their hooves down.
It's actually a success, as far as I can tell! Champ's feet looked pretty good before, and they look AMAZING now. Here's a blurry pic of his RF in March 07 (barefoot for 3 months, IIRC.)
Here's his LF from last week. The wall looks horrible and ragged, but it's wearing off. Not chipping off nicely into a mustang roll like if he lived on rock, but somehow wearing off nonetheless. And his FROGS! I really had no idea that his frogs could and would expand so much, ever! He wore keg shoes from when he was probably 2 til 13, and he had nice-ish shod feet with puny frogs.
Here's his rear from March 07. His rears have always looked better (most horses' do), even though he wore shoes on the rears too. I thought he had nicer frogs, but high inside heels.
LOOK AT THE DIFFERENCE! (Yeah, I know I'm yelling, but I'm a nerd and I get really excited about pretty frogs.) I even think the high inside heel is not as prominent.
At first, when I was looking through the pictures I'd taken, I really thought that was a picture of Poppy's feet. But I *know* I didn't pick up anybody's feet except Champ, and Poppy has a longer thicker tail and hairier fetlocks, so... that must be Champ's foot.
And I didn't pick up Dixie Quinn's feet, but I don't have any old pictures of solar views anyway. We'll compare apples to apples with her. Here's her feet, shortly after I got her. The short back story is that she was a padded show horse for a season, then shod (fronts only) with heavy keg shoes. Her hoof capsules were horribly distorted - padded TWHs are the very definition of long toes / underrun heels. This is about a month after I got her and had her shoes pulled. You can see how much I pulled her toes back.
Here they are today. Down in the grass you can see a tiny bit of ski-tip still growing out, but otherwise, her feet have healed really nicely.
Horses!
Exam tip: In MS, the jury is entitled to consider insulting or abusive language as a complete defense or a mitigating circumstance for assault or battery cases. Don't cuss somebody and expect them not to hit you.
So last Saturday I went and visited with my horses. I've been going every Saturday and spending some time with them. The fly stuff is actually working! If I remember to get the name of it when I'm in the truck next, I'll post a link to it. The horses are HUGE. They still like me :3 and want to come hang out when I show up. The spotted one is finally calming down - she was so spooky and wild that I figured two months in a pasture would either make her totally wild or let her finally calm down. Glad she calmed down!
Pictures of my fatasses:
First,
Here is gorgeous fat Champ eating oats out of a bucket with Silky.
Silky looks good! She's slender and could use more muscle, but I'm just happy she's plump.
Poppy is EXTREMELY LARGE. He preferred to eat his oats straight out of the bag in the truck. (After everybody had a taste of oats I locked the bag in the truck, which REALLY PISSED OFF Champ.)
The spotted one came and said hi too! She was really very inquisitive last weekend, and she let me touch her pretty much all over, as long as I kept it brief. I didn't even halter her to put the fly stuff on her. Yay!
Here's a body shot of her. Her roan flanks look even more frosted in person.
Here is a bonus picture of a very loud very angry bull. I have thoughtfully chosen the shot which does *not* show his pizzle. You just get to see the drool and the giant balls. He and his brother, in an adjascent pasture, bellowed most of the time I was out there.
And here's poor Cersei, hiding in the truck from the spotted one. Yes, the young'uns chased Cersei a couple of times. I've learned to leave the truck open so she has an escape route.
Next up: Economic torts, then a post about their hooves!
So last Saturday I went and visited with my horses. I've been going every Saturday and spending some time with them. The fly stuff is actually working! If I remember to get the name of it when I'm in the truck next, I'll post a link to it. The horses are HUGE. They still like me :3 and want to come hang out when I show up. The spotted one is finally calming down - she was so spooky and wild that I figured two months in a pasture would either make her totally wild or let her finally calm down. Glad she calmed down!
Pictures of my fatasses:
First,
Here is gorgeous fat Champ eating oats out of a bucket with Silky.
Silky looks good! She's slender and could use more muscle, but I'm just happy she's plump.
Poppy is EXTREMELY LARGE. He preferred to eat his oats straight out of the bag in the truck. (After everybody had a taste of oats I locked the bag in the truck, which REALLY PISSED OFF Champ.)
The spotted one came and said hi too! She was really very inquisitive last weekend, and she let me touch her pretty much all over, as long as I kept it brief. I didn't even halter her to put the fly stuff on her. Yay!
Here's a body shot of her. Her roan flanks look even more frosted in person.
Here is a bonus picture of a very loud very angry bull. I have thoughtfully chosen the shot which does *not* show his pizzle. You just get to see the drool and the giant balls. He and his brother, in an adjascent pasture, bellowed most of the time I was out there.
And here's poor Cersei, hiding in the truck from the spotted one. Yes, the young'uns chased Cersei a couple of times. I've learned to leave the truck open so she has an escape route.
Next up: Economic torts, then a post about their hooves!
I'm still alive, really!
Still studying. Just under 4 weeks to go!
Dog update first. I've been taking Cersei to the unofficial dog park to play instead of out to the barn to play. There's several reasons - Sam the Barn Dog has fleas and keeps giving them to Cersei; it's twice as far to the barn as to the park; seeing other people's horses and not mine is kinda :(
Memphis in general is weird, yall. It's not just ghetto Frayser. The whole town is permeated with weirdness.
The Overton Park "dog park." First, it's not a dog park. I think we only have one official dog park, on the other side of the city in Shelby Farms. This is just an area in Overton Park where, by consensus, everybody brings their dogs to play off leash. The Not A Dog Park (NDP) is part of a large field, with a truly nasty concrete pond. There's a treasured patch of old-growth forest nearby, and a golf course all around.
The forest is another Memphis oddity. Back in the 60s, the highway dept wanted to build I-40 through the park, to connect East Memphis to Downtown. The Midtown hippies were up in arms (and rightly so, it's not just a park. It really is as close as you can get to untouched forest in any city). There was a lawsuit that dragged on for ten years, and finally the highway dept lost. In honor of this historic decision, they left the uncompleted access ramps and bridges to nowhere standing for the next 30 years. Seriously, two years ago there was a big renovation of part of our highways, and the Bridges to Nowhere were finally torn down. Just a surreal bit of Memphis history.
Back to the dog park. Cersei really loves to swim in the horrid nasty concrete pond, and she's warming up to the dogs who play there. She'll play with any given dog after she's met it twice, so she's starting to get some "friends." Notable characters and dogs I've met:
It's very strange. A very libertarian dog park. You can't yell at somebody for not controlling her dog (coughRottweilergirlcough) because none of us are supposed to be there. Non dog people wander through all the time. It is very odd to me when pit bulls run off to lick non dog owner kids, but nobody seems to mind. There are so many pits in Memphis that the general awareness about them is much higher - odds are that the non dog people at the park have friends or family with a pit, so they know that pits aren't actually babyeaters. And the pit owners are actually more aware of possible dog aggression than the non pit owners.
Cersei's number one favorite thing to do is still just to go swim around in circles by herself. She doesn't really want to retrieve, she just wants to swim in circles. About a quarter of the time she'll come out of the water and play with her "friends." She's getting more comfortable with the other dogs every day, and honestly, as long as she's having a good time, she can do what she wants out there.
I'm going to write out some notes and when my hand gets tired of writing, I'll come post HORSE PICTURES and write about my large useless beggars.
Dog update first. I've been taking Cersei to the unofficial dog park to play instead of out to the barn to play. There's several reasons - Sam the Barn Dog has fleas and keeps giving them to Cersei; it's twice as far to the barn as to the park; seeing other people's horses and not mine is kinda :(
Memphis in general is weird, yall. It's not just ghetto Frayser. The whole town is permeated with weirdness.
The Overton Park "dog park." First, it's not a dog park. I think we only have one official dog park, on the other side of the city in Shelby Farms. This is just an area in Overton Park where, by consensus, everybody brings their dogs to play off leash. The Not A Dog Park (NDP) is part of a large field, with a truly nasty concrete pond. There's a treasured patch of old-growth forest nearby, and a golf course all around.
The forest is another Memphis oddity. Back in the 60s, the highway dept wanted to build I-40 through the park, to connect East Memphis to Downtown. The Midtown hippies were up in arms (and rightly so, it's not just a park. It really is as close as you can get to untouched forest in any city). There was a lawsuit that dragged on for ten years, and finally the highway dept lost. In honor of this historic decision, they left the uncompleted access ramps and bridges to nowhere standing for the next 30 years. Seriously, two years ago there was a big renovation of part of our highways, and the Bridges to Nowhere were finally torn down. Just a surreal bit of Memphis history.
Back to the dog park. Cersei really loves to swim in the horrid nasty concrete pond, and she's warming up to the dogs who play there. She'll play with any given dog after she's met it twice, so she's starting to get some "friends." Notable characters and dogs I've met:
- The Asian guy with the intact boxer. Not a show dog or a wonderful specimen of boxer-ness. I suspect he just doesn't want to genitally mutilate his dog. Whatever.
- The sweet gay guy with that odd-looking black GSD. Well, I thought Diablo was a GSD until yesterday, when he admitted that the dog is half GSD and half timberwolf. Normally I'd call bullshit, but he wasn't bragging, just kind of matter of fact about it. Someone asked him about Diablo, and he told us. (I still don't think Diablo is an F1. He's SO laid back and SO doggy.)
- The girl with the enormous BYB pit bull. Her dog is really sweet, and just a puppy who wants to play, but at 9 months the dog is already like 80 lbs. HUGE.
- The guy with the two tiny perfect little pit bulls. His are both rescues, and they look to my untrained eye exactly like pit bulls should look. Maybe 50-60 lbs, shorter than Cersei, alligator jaws and built like tanks. I'm glad Cersei's taken a liking to them.
- The girl with the out of control huge 80 lb Rottweiler puppy. Another one Cersei's age, but this dog really initimidates / bullies / annoys her. The Rott wants to play tackle football with every dog out there. Whenever the Rott knocks Cersei down, I go over and make the Rott back off and let my girl up.
- And Cersei has a Chihuahua buddy! At first I was really reluctant to let her play chase games with a 5 lb dog, but the owners swore that the Chi loves big dogs and Cersei isn't very prey-drivey. And damn that little dude is FAST. Even if she wanted to chase him down and kill him she wouldn't have a chance.
It's very strange. A very libertarian dog park. You can't yell at somebody for not controlling her dog (coughRottweilergirlcough) because none of us are supposed to be there. Non dog people wander through all the time. It is very odd to me when pit bulls run off to lick non dog owner kids, but nobody seems to mind. There are so many pits in Memphis that the general awareness about them is much higher - odds are that the non dog people at the park have friends or family with a pit, so they know that pits aren't actually babyeaters. And the pit owners are actually more aware of possible dog aggression than the non pit owners.
Cersei's number one favorite thing to do is still just to go swim around in circles by herself. She doesn't really want to retrieve, she just wants to swim in circles. About a quarter of the time she'll come out of the water and play with her "friends." She's getting more comfortable with the other dogs every day, and honestly, as long as she's having a good time, she can do what she wants out there.
I'm going to write out some notes and when my hand gets tired of writing, I'll come post HORSE PICTURES and write about my large useless beggars.
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